Time Doesn't Stand Still
by Davenee
Summary: After being locked in the ghost zone for ten years, Danny finally escapes to find everything he once knew has flipped upside down. Chap. 11: Danny's plan for peace is outbid.
1. It's been ten years

"Don't touch that, honey. You'll burn yourself." Sam Manson was franticly running around the kitchen, attempting to fix some sort of meal for Charlie, her nine-year-old daughter, when someone knocked at the door.

"Charlie, will you get the door for me." Sam asked, standing on her tip-toes, and stretching to reach a can of Spaghetti-O's. Without a word the little girl slid from the counter top where she was sitting and pranced down the short hallway to the front door. Timidly, she opened it just wide enough for her to poke her head out view the mysterious visitor. A young man, whom she had never seen met her gaze and although he seemed somewhat familiar, he was a stranger none-the-less.

"Oh, hi, um my name is Danny. Does Sam Manson live here?"

"My mommy said I'm not supposed to talk to strangers."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I'm not a stranger I promise. Your mother is right. You should never talk to strangers, but I'm not going to hurt you. I'm just looking for an old friend. Could you just go get your mommy so I could find out where my friends lives?"

Charlie nodded and scampered back to the kitchen where Sam was busy setting the table. "Mommy there's a strange man at the door. He said he's looking for someone, and that you may be able to tell him."

"Did he tell you his name?"

"I think he said his name was Danny, but I didn't catch his last…"

The glasses Sam was carrying fell, dramatically, from her arms and hit the floor with a thunderous crash. "D-D-Danny, That's impossible."

"That's what he said. What's wrong mommy?"

"N-n-nothing sweetie. Your d-dinner is on the table. Just wait right here. I'll be back in a second."

Sam sighed, closing the kitchen door behind her.

Danny… It couldn't be. Danny must be the name of one of those stupid magazine salesmen. Her friend, Danny Fenton, died ten years ago. She saw it happen. There was no reason she should believe this stranger her daughter spoke of was…

"Danny Fenton!" Sam gasped opening the front door wide enough to get a good look at the man on the other side.

"Sam," Danny smiled.

"But, but this is impossible, you're d-d-dead."

"Well I _am_ already half-dead."

Sam couldn't take it, him being here. Her eyes lingered for one moment on those beautiful baby blue eyes. He looked good, taller than she remembered, toner, yet not so much like his father. His hair was black as ever, and he still had the same dorky smile as when they were just to reckless high school seniors. Sam took one moment to soak it all in, and then slammed the door in his face.

"Sam! Common!" Danny pleaded to the shut door. "Aren't you happy to see me, I've missed you so much!"

"How could you leave me like that, Daniel Fenton!"

"I'm sorry Sam! It wasn't my choice."

"Whatever."

"Look just give me a second to explain myself. I want to see you Sam. I'll walk right through that door if you don't open it."

"Are you threatening me?"

"Please Sam."

Sam sighed, giving in. Her heart ached as she opened the door and stared, once more into that irresistible blue gaze. "You have no idea what I've been through since you left."

"I know, just give me a chance to explain myself."

"Five minutes."

"That's all I ask."

Danny walked awkwardly into the small corridor. "Nice place, dark, just the way the Sam Manson I knew would like it."

Sam pretended to ignore him, leading the way to the purple living room. Upon their arrival, Sam relaxed in her favorite black armchair across from Danny on the couch.

"So, how have you been in the last decade?" he began slowly.

"Cut the crap Danny. I wanna know where the hell _you've_ been. You left you friends, your family, your life! We haven't had a single ghost attack since you left. What did you do?"

"You don't remember?"

"Remember what?"

Danny gazed somberly into Sam's amethyst eyes, "The accident in the lab… the war… the portal…"

"What are you talking about?"

"Sam, I've been trapped in the ghost zone for ten years! You were there! Ghosts were taking over the world, it was a full scale invasion, oh gee lets lock all the ghosts back in the zone!"

"I remember the war, but not an accident in the lab. Ten years ago we were searching for a solution, any solution on how we could establish peace between the two worlds."

"And we decided to lock all the ghost back in the zone and destroy all the portals forever."

"Danny, all I remember is waking up in your bed. Your mom was an emotional wreck, your dad wouldn't speak, and Jazz told me you died. We all thought you were dead, Danny! Dead!"

"But…"

"No, it's too late. I have a life now and a kid! It's been TEN YEARS!"

Her last few words struck Danny as if he had run into a brick wall (And not gone intangible). "You have a kid?" He asked curiously just as a black haired figure poked her head out from the closed kitchen door. She had obviously been disturbed by the raised tone her mother was using with the stranger.

"Mommy?"

"Sweetie, go back in the kitchen. I'll be there in a second."

Charlie ignored her and turned to face Danny, "Who are you, really?"

"He's just an old friend." Sam directed her next sentence straight to Danny, "Nothing more."

The small child allowed her mother to nudge her back into the kitchen. Sam sighed as she closed the door, slowly turning to face Danny once more.

"You'd better go."

"Cute kid."

"That's Charlie. She's an angel really. After you died, or left sorry, she, she saved me."

"If you don't mind me asking, who is her father?"

"Let me show you to the door."

Danny stood up and rushed between Sam and the doorframe to the hallway "I'm Sorry Sam. I really am. You're the only thing that kept me alive for ten years in the ghost zone! The thought of you here alive and safe, the hope that someday this day would come!"

"Charlie's father, he died, Danny." Sam cut him off, pushing past him on the way to the door.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I've moved on." Sam wrenched the door open, exposing the cramped hallway to the chilly night air. "Just go Danny, go see your family."

"But,"

"Just leave, please."

Danny nodded sadly and, acknowledging his defeat, looked Sam in the eye one last time. Suddenly two rings of light formed around his waist transforming Danny Fenton into Danny Phantom. His shaggy hair became the purest shade of white, his blue eyes glowing green, his black and white suit formed nicely around the muscular curves of his body.

"I've always loved you Sam, and I know you're hurting, but maybe someday… maybe things can be like they were. Two, reckless kids, in love, out to face the world." And with those last words Danny, took to the sky before Sam had time to process what he had just said.

Charlie heard the stranger leave and pattered out of the kitchen to find her mother, sobbing in a ball of hysterics on the floor. "Mommy," the child reached down and gently grabbed her hand. Sam wrapped her daughter into a tight embrace as Charlie wiped the tears from her mother's cheek.


	2. Homecomming

Thanks to all who reviewed! The support I was given, and the burst of creative energy, after writing just one chapter prompted me to whip out the second. This is Danny's return to his family after his ten-year absence; hopefully a little more heartwarming than the cold shoulder he was shown at Sam's (he he)!

_Anyway… I can't always promise such a speedy update; however, unless I'm tragically struck by an unfortunate case of writer's block than I will try to update about once a week. _

_Oh and for anyone who is a fan of Sam's daughter, Charlie, from the previous chapter, be sure to tune in for a Danny/ Charlie confrontation in chapter 3!_

_Merry reading…_

_Davenee_

Fenton Works, home of the eccentric inventors and hunters of anything paranormal, Jack and Maddie Fenton. The sight of his old home almost brought tears to his eyes as he landed gently on the familiar doorstep. From the outside, nothing had changed.

Danny sighed, slightly nervous. What if his parents reacted the same way as Sam? Nevertheless, he reverted back to his human form and knocked on his own front door.

After a few suspenseful moments a woman in a blue jumpsuit and red inventor's goggles came to call, instantly unsheathing a long ecto-bazooka and pointing it in Danny's unsuspecting face.

"Who are you and what do you want! This is private property, no soliciting! Either you answer my questions in two seconds or hit the road pal! I am not afraid to pull this trigger!"

"Mom?" Danny asked softly, unperturbed by the unwelcome greeting. After growing up with the Fenton's, this sort of house warming was something he had grown to expect.

"Mom? I'm not your mother. I don't know who the hell you are."

"It's me, Mom. It's me Danny."

"Danny?" The woman lowered her weapon, pulled back her hood and goggles, letting her long red hair tumble gracefully down her back. "That's impossible, my brother died ten years ago."

"Jazz!" Danny lost control and swept his sister into a surprise death squeeze, knocking her out of breath. "Oh I'm sorry, Jazz I,"

"I-It c-can't be," she gasped between coughs, sputtering for air.

"I'm back Jazz. It's me."

She pulled out her bazooka again directing it at Danny's chest. "How do I know you're not an imposter? If you really are my brother than prove it."

And by prove it Danny knew exactly what she meant. Instantly the rings of light formed around his waist transforming him once again into Danny Phantom. "It's me, sis."

"Danny!" Jazz began to cry dropping her weapon and falling into her little brother's not-so-little-anymore arms. For a few moments Jazz sobbed uncontrollably in Danny's embrace, like Sam, stunned into silence.

"It's been so long," She sniffed after a while, "Everything, nothing's, Mom!" she called. "Mom, come here quick!"

"Jazz what is it? Is everything alright?" Another woman also dawning a blue jumpsuit emerged from the basement of Fenton Works yielding yet an even larger bazooka. His family was so predicable.

"Mom," Jazz ran to her mother's side her face stained with tears. "It's Danny. He's back. He's back just like I told you he would be."

"Danny?" Her eyes met the glowing green of Phantom's gaze as Danny reverted back to his human form.

"Mom," Danny gasped as he walked slowly over to his mother's side.

Maddie Fenton starred in disbelief at the sight of her twenty-eight-year-old son, her baby. Like Jazz, tears began to fall slowly down her face as she slowly caressed the cheek of her presumably dead son. Shaking violently she stroked the back of Danny's long black hair and he in-turn reeled her into a deep hug.

"I'm back mom," Danny whispered. He just couldn't stop saying those words.

"Oh Danny, I, we all thought you were,"

"Dead, I know. I've heard, Sam told me. W-Where's Dad?"

Maddie's sobs turned into wails as she clung tighter to her son's neck.

"Danny," Jazz laid a hand on her brother's broad shoulder, "Dad died eight years ago, in the lab. We think he was, well, Dad changed after you died. He blamed himself for it, for your death I mean. He claimed if he had never built the portal that gave you your powers none of this would have happened. We think he was trying to find a way to bring you back."

"Bring me back?"

"Yes, I tried to tell him, I believed you were still alive. I always hoped."

The three Fentons embraced each other for the first time in ten years. The moment was pure gold, and for Danny the homecoming he had dreamed about for a decade locked in the ghost zone.

Finally they broke apart, but Maddie never took her eyes off her son. "So Danny, if you didn't die. Where did you go? What happened?"

"The Ghost Zone. Sam, Tuck, and I were trying to find a way to separate the two worlds forever after the fighting broke out. We tried to suck all the ghosts back in the zone and destroy the portals forever, and it worked. But I think the portal took me for a ghost and locked me inside like the rest."

"So," Maddie asked, "Are you the only one that escaped?"

"That's the real trick, I know Danielle was with me, but the portals are open again. How many, I'm not sure. How it happened? Couldn't tell you. How many ghost have and are continuing to escape? All I know is I have a gut feeling Fenton Works better be ready for business."

"I just knew this day would come!" Jazz squealed with excitement. "It'll be just like old times."

Maddie smiled and nodded.

"Yeah," Danny added, "I guess it will. Oh and speaking of old times? Where's Tucker. I haven't seen him yet."

Jazz smiled, "Oh Tucker, He's in Washington."

"The state?"

"No the capital. He's been elected to Congress. Being the youngest mayor in Amity Park history sort of jump-started his political career."

Danny laughed, "I never thought that Tucker, wow. And what about you Jazz, did Yale suit you?"

"Well, I actually dropped out." Jazz blushed, knowing this question would come.

"What?"

"Yeah, after you disappeared I took the semester off to help out at home. Then Dad died, and I just couldn't go back. Brown stone kind of looses its luster after you've been surrounded by ghost hunting lab equipment. And besides, It was hard finding a moment of privacy when everyone on campus knows you're little brother is a half-ghost super hero."

"Oh, sorry about that."

"Don't mention it. I tried so hard my whole life to fight becoming who I really am, a ghost hunter, just like my family. Once a Fenton always a Fenton I guess."

The small family smiled. "So, another war?" Maddie asked her son.

"It looks that way."

"Well we're ready if you are," Jazz said picking up her bazooka from the floor and resting it on her shoulder."

"Good," Danny nodded as a yawn escaped him, "And this Phantom will be ready as long as he has a chance to get some sleep."

"Sleep," Maddie laughed, "Just the thought of my boy sleeping in his own bed, safe where he belongs, will be enough to keep this wary mother awake all night."

Danny smiled, hugging his mom one more time, "I love you mom."

"I love you too. You'll find your room exactly as you left it."

"Well that makes one thing." Danny smiled, giving Jazz one last hug, before bolting up the stares to his old abode, leaving two Fenton women in the kitchen alone.

"Well you were right, Jazz." Maddie turned to face her eldest child after Danny had long gone. "I just,"

"I know Mom. I can't either."


	3. Changes and Hard Truths

_**Again I want to thank my reviewers. This is my first DP Fic and started as a sort of experiment; however, with your support has flourished into my favorite project I am currently working on. No seriously, I really need to spend more time on homework than writing this, but I can't.**_

_**Anyway I now present Chapter three: a nice Danny and Charlie confrontation ending with my first cliffhanger. Enjoy!**_

It felt odd, being back in the human world. Danny trudged slowly along the streets of his hometown, Amity Park. Nothing had changed drastically. Well nothing physically had, the people, Sam, Jazz, everyone he had ever loved. They were different.

Danny enjoyed the peace of walking through the streets unnoticed by anyone. According to Sam everyone thought Danny Phantom was dead and he decided that there was no reason to reveal himself until it was necessary.

He passed Casper High School. The mere sight of the building, the flagpole he had been strung to, the memories, almost brought tears to his blue eyes. It was on that lawn, the day of his high school graduation, he had spent his last day in this dimension, the world he belonged.

Sadly, he crossed the street into the park and plopped himself on a bench across from a jungle gym where a bunch of kids, one of them he noticed as Sam's daughter, were playing.

Danny watched with interest, as Charlie Manson played tag with a group of boys. She had black hair, a small frame, and free spirit like her mother. Her eyes, however, were the purest shade of sparkling blue unlike Sam's amethyst.

Yet while he enjoyed observing the child dominate the game she was playing, the mystery of her parentage began to haunt him. The thought that some strange man had been with, nevertheless impregnated Sam, _his_ Sam, during Danny's absence was utterly perturbing.

After a while, Charlie noticed Danny on the bench, recognizing him as the man who had come over to her house last night and made her mother cry. She waved goodbye to her friends and scampered across the green to where Danny was sitting.

"Hi Charlie," Danny greeted her, preparing himself to leave.

"Oh no you don't," Charlie huffed.

"What?"

A sharp, flaming pain below his knee answered Danny's question where the nine-year-old delivered a forceful kick to his shins. "Ouch," Danny gasped rubbing his injured leg.

"That's what boys get for making my mommy cry!"

"Charlie, I didn't mean too. You don't understand."

"I'm nine years old, I know plenty." The child prepared to strike again; however, this time Danny knew what was coming and caught her mid stride.

"The situation between your mother and I, well, it's complicated. Far more so than I had hoped." Danny spoke softly to the struggling, infuriated child wriggling in his grasp.

"I don't think so."

"Well it is," Danny sighed and placed Charlie back on the ground. "Isn't bad enough I have to take this kind of rejection from Sam."

"You hurt her feelings."

"It was an accident!" Danny couldn't believe he was raising his voice to a nine-year-old. Angrily he wheeled around and began strutting irritably in the opposite direction.

Danny was unsure of how long he walked, all the while, pondering and swearing about how much everything had changed. Sam was a wreck, Tucker was miles away, Jazz was a college dropout, and his dad was dead. It was still hard to believe his father, Jack Fenton, the one person he knew was just ditzy and oblivious enough to cheer him up was gone forever.

Danny found himself standing just outside Amity Park Cemetery, a cold bleak plot on the outskirts of downtown. After a minute of contemplating whether to go in or not, Danny sighed and plunged forward into the dreary void.

A slight breeze picked up; rustling the fallen October leaves from the dusty ground as Danny searched. What was compelling him, driving him to act thus, Danny didn't know. All he could feel was that by seeing his father's grave, being near the last standing monument to Jack's memory would satisfy him somehow.

And then he found it, standing gray and erect from the hard dusty floor, a dark symbol of everything Danny had lost, the grave of Jack Fenton. Slowly, Danny approached the stony sepulcher and placed one trembling hand on its rocky surface as if he was testing to see if it was actually real.

"I miss you, Dad," He whispered silently to the lifeless monument, "You would have made everything better."

"Mr. Danny," a little girlish voice piped up from behind a large marble mausoleum. Charlie Manson emerged slowly, and timidly knelt beside the tombstone next to Danny.

"What do you want?" Danny grumbled, slightly agitated by the fact the child was stalking him.

"I-is this your Dad? Jack Fenton?"

All Danny could do was nod. "And I never got to tell him goodbye. The smile on his face the day I graduated from high school, I didn't know that would be the last time I…" A small tear rolled gently down Danny's soft cheek.

"Sounds like he was a good guy."

"The best," Danny sighed, "He wasn't the brightest or most skilled, but he cared immeasurably for his family and friends. I guess that's what really matters anyway."

This time it was Charlie's brilliant blue eyes that swelled with tears, "At least you have happy memories to remember him by. I couldn't even tell you my father's name."

"You never knew him?"

Charlie shook her head, "All mommy ever tells me is that he's dead now and life has to continue moving on. She says these things, but I don't think even she has, moved on I mean. Mommy hurts a lot. It's almost like there is a piece missing to her puzzle and without that piece she can never be complete."

"I'm sorry."

"It's ok. I can't miss something I never had in the first place."

"Did Sam love him then, your father?"

"I don't really know for sure; I hope at least. Like every kid who has grown up in an untraditional, slightly dysfunctional family I guess it was always my dream for my long lost father to come riding in one day to save mommy and take us away to live happily ever after together as a family."

"But you don't anymore."

"No, I still do occasionally. I just also realize now how lucky I am to have what I do. Contrary to what mommy and many other adults believe, I may be nine but I'm not oblivious."

Danny smiled. Charlie was a clever girl with a free spirit and it was painful to see her confessing such things. "You're a good kid, Charlie, and for your sake I hope you get what you want."

Two pairs of blue eyes met and a smile lit up across the little girl's face as they both stood, brushing the dirt off themselves. Suddenly, however, their tender moment was interrupted by a loud clattering bang as a ghastly laugh emerged from beyond the destroyed remains of a nearby-decapitated statue. Danny and Charlie dove behind the nearest headstone to avoid the scattering debris.

"It's good to be back." The large ghostly figure cackled as he strode closer to Danny and Charlie. It was Skullker.

"Ten years bound to the ghost zone, unable to stretch my legs, I never thought I would be so pleased as to be able to reek havoc on the pathetic human world again."

"Skullker!" Danny emerged from behind the headstone, his temper rising. "You will not start this up again. The fighting is over."

"Ha, ha. And some tried to convince me your time in the ghost zone would make you sympathetic to our kind. Why stay in the ghost zone, so bleak and gruesome, when there is a whole other dimension teeming with power and wealth just waiting to be harvested!"

"I can't let you or any other ghost hurt these people again!"

"Well you better pick a side ghost child because the fighting is just about to begin!"

"Danny!" Charlie rose from behind the tomb as well, her small little face barley visible over the stone slab.

"Charlie stay down!" Danny yelled, but not before Skullker swooped down in a roar of laughter behind the terrified child, scooping her up in one of his large mechanical arms.

"You better make your choice ghost child. Another war is inevitable!"

"Charlie!" Danny yelled into the sky as Skullker flew away with the little girl kicking and screaming in his grasp.


	4. Not human

Yeah, Chapter 4 (my favorite number as I am a devoted Brett Favre fan)! Again I cannot stress how much I appreciate all the positive reviews (although constructive criticism is also welcome). If it wasn't for all of you urging me to crank out more chapters I would probably still be writing chapter 2.

Anyway about this chapter… This was probably my favorite to write thus far but had me stumped for a good while. I had three different options I was deciding between after the last chapter, but after a very helpful review, decided to scrap all three and came up with something I think is going to make the plot much thicker in the long run.

A Sam and Danny confrontation, the parentage of Charlie officially revealed (although many of you have guessed), and another nice cliffy (but make sure to tune in for chapter five, many questions will be answered)

And now presenting Chapter Four…

Davenee 

"I'm going ghost!" Danny yelled reverting to his ghost form and taking to the sky in hot pursuit of Skullker and Charlie.

"Which way did they go!" he stammered to himself, flying around in frantic circles. Danny shook his head, stunned by what he just let the mediocre hunter get away with. Letting a known enemy and feared ghost capture and escape with her nine-year-old daughter was not the way to go about rekindling his relationship with Sam.

"Options, options," Danny panicked struggling to secure the best a plan of action. "I have to tell Sam." He sighed regrettably; "She would probably be more pissed if I didn't," and he took off in the direction of her townhouse.

He turned intangible, swiftly weaving in and out of the crowd of people, as he swooped closer to the public eye. He didn't have to be noticed if he didn't want to.

Turning the corner he immediately flew right into Sam's front door and tumbled clumsily onto her living room floor. "Charlie is that you?" he heard Sam yell from upstairs.

"Sam, Sam, it's me, it's Danny!"

Sam rushed to the edge of the stairwell and glared angrily at Danny. "What do you want?"

"Um, well, it's Charlie."

"What about Charlie?"

"She was, and then I was, and then we were, and then…" he stuttered, "Skullker has her."

"WHAT!" Sam screamed so loud Danny swore he felt the house shake, "How could you let that mediocre pig-headed hunk of plastic fly away with our, I mean _my_ daughter!"

"It, he-he just, and before I could go,"

"Don't give me these lame excuses." Sam's eyes already reddened by rage swelled with tears, "Charlie is all I have. If you don't," she choked on her last words as Danny flew to the top of the staircase to stand beside her.

"I will find her, don't worry."

"Oh no you won't. You've screwed up my life enough. I'm coming with you!"

Danny couldn't help but smile, "Are you sure? I can handle it on my own."

"Oh I highly doubt it." Sam bolted into her room and emerged wielding a bag of ghost hunting supplies and an ecto blaster in her back pocket.

"I have a speeder parked below the garage, so I'll just meet you…"

"Oh no, we're flying."

"No I really think it would be best for me to take the speeder."

"Or you just don't want to fly with me."

"No that's not it, it's just,"

"What? You know it would be faster if we flew together and much more inconspicuous. We'll go intangible, nobody will sound an alarm, we'll take care of business, just like old times, and life can return to normal."

Sam sighed. She knew Danny was right, about both her feelings and which plan was more convenient. "Ok, but don't get any ideas."

"Ideas about what?"

"That I'm forgiving you!"

Danny had to repress a laugh as he grabbed Sam's dainty hand in his own white-gloved fist. "Don't worry," he smiled turning them both intangible, "I always knew you were the type to hold a grudge," and they took off in search Charlie.

Meanwhile on top of a tall, seven-story edifice, somewhere in the heart of downtown Amity Park, Skullker released Charlie, disturbed by her constant ear shattering screams.

"Shut up, filthy human child!"

"Let me go! You really don't want to make me angry!"

Laughing uncontrollably, Skullker unsheathed a long blaster from the forearm of his armor aiming it at the annoying mortal brat. "What difference does that make? You're nothing more than bait."

"Stop!" Charlie's screams intensified as the small girl collapsed on the floor, shaking in pain, although Skullker hadn't touched her. She pressed her hands firmly against her temples, hoping to quench the head-splitting twinge.

"Be quiet miniscule earthly horror! Silence your insufferable wail or prepare for me to silence it for you!"

Charlie whimpered in pain as her eyes turned a bright shade of glowing green.

"I told you not to make me angry," she cried, trembling, "Why can't you just let me go?"

"I need to see where Danny Phantom's loyalties lie."

"Danny Phantom?"

"Hey Skullker!" A deep voice ensured from behind the large mechanical ghost as Danny Phantom appeared out of nowhere. "Waiting for me!"

"Right on cue Ghost Boy. You made it just in time to watch me annihilate this little urchin!"

"Dude, I'm twenty-eight. You think you could at least come up with another name for me besides Ghost _Boy _or _Child. _I'm legal for cripes sake."

"Sorry old habits I guess," Skullker raged turning the tip of his gun toward Danny and firing a green ecto blast. Danny, however, blocked it easily with his ghost shield.

"Common Skullker, it doesn't have to be like this."

"But it does! Didn't ten years locked in the Ghost Zone teach you anything! Life in there can be hell." 

Danny twitched uncomfortably as he knew Skullker had a point.

"How long was that term you spent in Walker's prison? Didn't Frostbite's kingdom get cold after a while? You know as well as I that ghosts don't get along with each other. No matter what you are there is always someone out to get you and friendship does not exist. We need this world!"

"But that doesn't mean you have to hurt innocent people, especially nine-year-old girls. We can make peace!"

Skullker laughed, "Don't be ridiculous! Humans don't want peace. They hate us! How can you defend a race that would just as easily persecute you as worship you?"

"Some people can be flawed, but they're not all like that!"

"Sure they are, that's what makes them human." Skullker smiled crookedly.

Meanwhile, as Danny was distracting Skullker, Sam began franticly combing the rooftop for Charlie who had taken the temporary diversion to crawl behind a large pipe on the opposite side of the rooftop, away from the quibbling ghosts.

"Charlie," Sam whispered brushing the ground on her hands and knees. "Charlie," she called again as she picked up on the faint whimper of her daughter in pain.

"Mommy," Charlie murmured faintly, clutching her temples with her sweaty palms. "Mommy it hurts so bad. Make it stop please."

"Charlie, honey," Sam swept across the floor and attempted to cradle the girl in her arms but came up with nothing except air. Charlie just phased threw her grasp.

"Mommy, he made me really angry. The ghost, I tried to tell him not to but he just, and then the pain again,"

"Shh, Charlie, it's ok. I'm here now."

"Hold me."

"Sweetheart, you know I can't. Not until you calm yourself down. Just relax, let the pain subside and I'll get you out of here."

"This is worst than the last time. This is worst than ever before."

"I know, but you just need to relax."

Charlie took a deep breath and slowly her eyes stopped glowing, reverted back to their original baby blue, and Sam was able to gently embrace her daughter.

"Don't forget who you truly are Ghost Child. You're not human no matter how hard you try to be, and they will never fully except you." Skullker raged as the spat between the half ghost and hunter ensued.

"That may be so, but who are you to be the judge?"

Skullker extracted another gun from the arm of his mechanical suit and fired it at Danny, sending a jet of green light speeding toward him. Danny shifted to dodge it; however, like a boomerang, the beam adjusted its course to follow his movement and struck.

Danny collapsed on the roof of the high building, his arms and legs bound by glowing green cuffs.

"How about," Skullker advanced on Danny, struggling to free himself from the binds. "The world discovers Danny Phantom is back, but the Phantom they knew, their long lost hero, would not hurt an innocent human brat."

"Don't you touch her!" Danny glared angrily at the massive ghostly hunter and spat at his feet.

"Quite infuriating halfa!" Skullker loading his weapons, "As I said before. These nauseating humans may worship you now, but they would just as easily hunt and exploit you as I would. All it takes is one little slip, and you'll truly understand the narrow minded nature of these people you protect."

Skullker laughed menacingly and turned, weapons ready, to exterminate the squealing miniscule child, but she was gone.


	5. Won't Listen

Author's Note: WOW! That took a lot longer than expected. Sorry to all my readers about the wait. I am really enjoying writing this fic. It's something really new and almost refreshing to me, but I had the SAT last weekend and well had to make the adult choice and reprioritize !

**Oh well, so there is a flashback scene here to the first time Sam notices any sign of Charlie possibly possessing some of Danny's more unique qualities, but don't be fooled. I'm not planning on stuffing Charlie in a black and white jumpsuite and sending her off to fight ghosts anywhere in the future. I really am looking forward to playing around with her more… (I think I said too much)!**

**Happy reading!**

Flashback 

_It was three in the morning when Sam woke to infant Charlie's blood-curdling cries from down the hall. Sleepily the young mother slipped from the comfort of her bed and pulled on her black robe, trudging lazily to the little nursery._

_At this point in time Sam and Charlie were living in a fairly run-down apartment. There was a constant draft, and something would always mysteriously creak in the middle of the night waking the baby. _

"_Charlie," Sam whispered half-asleep, slowly opening the door to her baby's room. "Shh, honey," she whispered, standing juxtaposed the cradle peering down at her six-month-old daughter. Charlie was fiercely clenching the corners of her blanket; her little face was distorted and scrunched from crying and she appeared to be shriveling in pain. _

"_Hush, baby, mommy's here." Sam bent over to lift Charlie from her cradle; however, her arms seemed to simply phase through the infant's tiny body._

"_Charlie, stop fidgeting," Sam groaned, shaking her head in slight frustration, and reached into the crib, once more, to embrace her wailing daughter._

_After the second attempt Sam slowly began to shift into a stage of panic. Gently the young mother bent over Charlie and leaned down to stroke the small tuft of black hair on her little daughter's head, but simply couldn't touch her. _

_Tears of aggravation gradually began to swell in Sam's eyes as she watched her innocent baby girl, helplessly withering and sweating in pain. Sam began to pace nervously, growing accustomed to Charlie's ear-shattering screams._

"_What's wrong baby?" Sam desperately begged her infant daughter but, as she knew, to no avail._

_Sam collapsed at the side of the cradle staring helplessly at Charlie through the bars. "I'm a horrible mother!" she sobbed. The insurmountable agony she felt for not being able to console the girl consumed her._

_Charlie began to thrash her little arms and legs wildly through the air, scarcely able to make out her mother's voice over the buzzing, blinding sensation welling within her tiny head. Her eyes were burning and body shaking, but why wasn't her mother doing anything. Charlie waved her arms frantically in the air wanting nothing more than to be gently caressed against her mother's bosom._

_Desperately, Charlie turned her head and looked up at Sam as if she was crying out for help._

"_No," Sam gasped, meeting her infant's defenseless gaze. Or was it? Charlie's eyes were the sweetest shade of baby blue, but now however, as Sam peered down at her daughter lying helplessly in her crib, they omitted strange green glow. _

_Sam's stomach flip-flopped. For a moment she was lost, and Charlie was not Charlie. She was fixed upon that green-eyed gaze, and for a moment, he was there. _

"_Danny," Sam stammered running her fingers nervously threw her messy, now sweaty black hair. She shut her eyes tight, unable to look her own daughter in the face anymore. _

"_Turn that thing off! It's three in the morning!" One of her neighbors pounded angrily on the wall of the nursery, accompanied by the family above banging angrily on the floor with a broom."_

_Sam sighed heavily and shook her head, "No, no, no, baby you can't, how do I, where can I, I need…" Sam choked on her tears, whispering the in calmest most hushed tone she could muster. _

"_I know your hurting and probably don't understand, but you need to calm down. Just try and take a deep breath and relax" Sam sighed, "If Danny were here he would know what to do."_

_Sam opened her eyes and peered down at Charlie. "Why am I being tormented like this, huh? Isn't it bad enough I had to loose Danny before we ever even had a chance to get married? He's dead, gone, but I see him now. He's in your eyes baby. He's in you."_

_A single tear tumbled softly down Sam's stained cheeks as Charlie's sobs drew steadily softer. "Your father is watching over us now, I can feel it. Be strong, sweetheart, be brave. Close your eyes, baby, and relax. Only you have the power to make the pain go away."_

_Charlie's cries subsided into a soft moan and Sam bent over and gently grazed her soft cheek. Hastily, Sam hoisted the infant from her crib as if she would fade away again if she didn't act sooner. _

"_Charlie," Sam clung her daughter tightly to her breast, collapsed on the floor against the crib, and casually rocked the child to sleep._

Sam smiled, recollecting her thoughts as she watched Charlie sleeping soundly in the bed at her side. It had been a long day for the little girl. Danny flew through the door into living room and called for Sam who, quickly, placed another wet rag to her daughter's forehead and tiptoed quietly into the living room.

"Hey, would you keep it down." Sam whispered harshly from over the edge of the balcony, "And what ever happened to knocking?"

"Sorry, Sam. I just wanted to make sure you and Charlie were alright."

"Yeah, No thanks to you." Sam turned her back on him. "You really screwed up this time Fenton!"

"Fenton, since when did you start calling me Fenton!"

"Since the day my best friend died."

"I though we went over this. I'm sorry Sam, about everything, but I'm being serious." Two rings of light formed at his waist changing Danny Phantom back into Danny Fenton as he slowly began to ascend the staircase, "Charlie looked hurt up on the rooftop. Is-is she going to be ok?"

Sam nodded slowly. "I think so, but what does it matter to you?"

"What do you mean Sam? Why wouldn't it matter, I care about you, I love you. Charlie is your daughter."

Sam shifted uncomfortably, turned slowly to face Danny, and for a split second her eyes locked with his brilliant baby-blues, the ones that made her heart melt.

"C-can I see her," Danny stuttered.

"No!" Sam jerked away harshly, breaking the temporary tranquil peace that had surmounted between the two. "No, she's sick, and wouldn't be if you hadn't let that air-headed ghost loser take her!"

"She's sick?" Danny looked down at his feet, feeling a pang of guilt.

"Yes, b-but that has nothing to do with you. She," Sam hesitated, "She's always been that way."

"She didn't look sick when I saw her at the park today."

"That's because it only happens when she gets really angry or stressed." Sam shook her head, resuming her angry tone, "But what does it matter to you!"

"I'm sorry, Sam. It was an accident. I didn't mean for Charlie to get sick!"

"Charlie has been sick!"

"And the doctors don't know what to do."

Sam folded her arms across her chest and shook her head, "Nope,"

"And there's nothing I can do."

"No!" Sam yelled angrily. "Why would you say that? You can't help everyone Danny!"

"But…"

"You know what, you can help. By leaving." Sam slowly advance on Danny standing stunned in the hallway. "And so help me, Phantom, if I catch you near _my_ daughter again I'll send you BACK to the ghost zone!"

Danny sighed as her reverted back to ghost form, "Sam I'm really sorry I hurt you or Charlie, but your never going to settle down to let me explain my side of the story. We may have been kids back when everything happened last time, but we're not anymore. Something big is going down and for your safety I suggest we put the past behind us and start acting like the adults we have been forced to become."

Sam was so stunned she looked as if she had been hit by semi-truck, and for the second time in twenty-four hours, Danny turned intangible and flew away through the ceiling, leaving her alone on the balcony, completely astounded.


	6. Forever In Our Hearts, Back In Our Lives

**Author's Note: OK so the last chapter was my shortest so to compensate for that and the incredibly long wait here is my longest and what has turned out to be, in my opinion, one of my favorites. I decided to take a break from Sam and Charlie for a bit to catch Danny up with the rest of the world…so here you go…oh and another cliffy!**

**Merry reading… Davenee**

"That's right folks, for the first time in nearly a decade ghosts have been spotted in Amity Park." The TV buzzed in the living room causing Danny to slump further in his seat at the kitchen table.

"Great Sam hates me, Skullker's loose, and now more ghosts. I'm starting to think my homecoming wasn't the greatest idea."

"Oh common, Danny don't be so hard on yourself." Jazz urged from across the table, "We'll round those ghosts up, and don't worry about Sam. She doesn't hate you, I promise."

"She told me to get lost," Danny hopelessly flicked his frosted flakes with his spoon until they became soggy.

"You have to understand, after you left Sam suffered a severe psychological setback. For some people the only way to cope with loss is to completely sever any emotional or physiological ties with sed person so naturally,"

"Jazz," Danny interrupted.

"What?"

He smiled, "I guess some things haven't changed as much as I thought. Just tone the psychobabble down a little bit. "

Jazz nodded, "It's good to have you home little brother, and I will. Hold on one second." Jazz raced upstairs and came down a few moments later yielding a rather hefty book. "All I'm trying to say is," she passed the novel across the table to Danny, "That your sudden reappearance has left her confused and disjointed. Give her time and a little space."

Danny picked up the book and examined the cover thoroughly. "Forever Phantom, Forever In Our Hearts," he turned it slowly over to the spine, "By Sam Manson. What is this?"

"It's your biography, told from her perspective. You see Danny she never forgot you, and never could. The reason she's hurting so much is because she loves you."

"I hope you're right." He sighed half smiling half bewildered.

"Danny, Jazz!" Maddie yelled from the lab. "I need you two immediately!"

Without haste Jazz and Danny dashed from the kitchen and descended the stairs into the lab where Maddie was waiting beside a large radar screen.

"Man does it feel good to say that again," Maddie smiled with both of her children beside her before turning back to the screen. "Anyway we need a plan and fast. If we don't act soon this place will be overrun with ghosts before lunch. I have a closet full of thermoses, I say we divide and conquer."

"No," Danny yelled, alarming the two women. "I mean, I don't think we should use the thermoses."

"Why not?" Maddie and Jazz asked simultaneously.

"Well," Danny pondered and proceeded cautiously with two anti-anything-ecto females shooting him exasperated glances, "None of the ghosts have hurt anybody so far right? Except Skullker, I mean. But all the others, they have just been ghost sightings. I think we should only use the thermoses if the ghost in question poses a threat to someone.

"Where is this coming from?" Maddie asked her son curiously.

"From ten years trapped in the ghost zone. It's not a pretty place and I bet some of these ghosts only want to get out and stretch their legs. Ghosts just don't get along and without the human world to turn to, the ghost zone became a war zone."

Maddie and Jazz were stunned, but Danny continued. "I just don't think it's fair to send them high tailing it back there if they haven't done anything wrong."

"So we're just going to let a bunch of ghosts float around here?" Maddie asked.

"Yeah, Danny, think about it." Jazz added, "Besides you the public doesn't like ghosts very much."

"Which is why I'm going to come clean. I need to reveal myself and reassure Amity Park the ghosts are harmless."

"Yeah," Jazz smiled, "With you watching over them, they'll feel safe. But are you sure you're ready to come out of hiding. Remember how it was last time you exposed yourself."

Danny sighed, "But maybe with my mind on everyone else's problems I'll forget about Sam for a while. It's simply not fair for me to sit back and do nothing anyway. After all, I'm not one to just sit on the sidelines."

Maddie nodded proudly, "You really have grown up. You're father would be proud."

"Thanks mom," Danny beamed, embracing his mother tightly, before the radar began to buzz.

"Alright Danny," Jazz directed, "It looks like a ghost has been spotted north of down town around the school. You take that, while mom and I patrol the south sector. Oh, and good luck." She smiled giving her brother a short peck on the cheek before Danny Fenton became Danny Phantom and took off.

It felt good to be soaring aimlessly through the clouds again. Flying seemed to alleviate him of all his earthly problems. He felt so free Danny wished he never had to come back down; however, the unsettling noise of dramatic screams and frightened civilians from below drew his attention back on the job.

Danny descended to locate the epicenter of the commotion, which seemed to becoming from a FedEx.

"FedEx?" Danny muttered out loud drawing alongside the packaging depot. "There's noting there but staples and boxes what would a ghost want…"

"BEWARE!"

"Never mind," Danny sighed, slapping himself in the face for being so stupid. "All this for the cruddy Box Ghost!"

"BEWARE, for I am the Box Ghost," the blue tinted phantom floated aimlessly behind the counter. "The portal has been opened and I am free! Now surrender your boxes or prepare to face your ultimate doom and destruction!"

The frightened clerk crouched defensively behind the counter as Danny flew through the ceiling and seized the not-so-spooky ghost by the neck.

"Hey Box Ghost, Can I talk to you for a second?"

"Not now Phantom. Can't you see I am busy?"

"That's what I need to tell you. You can't do this."

"And why not?"

"Because if you do I will be forced to send you back to the Ghost Zone."

"In your puny thermos? That's not fair. How would you feel being sent back there? No matter what you do I'll just crawl out again!"

"I know," Danny sighed, "And I'm not going to send you or any other ghost back there as long as nobody gets hurt. Tell everyone that."

"So you're siding with them again."

"No, well, I-I, I just don't want anybody to get hurt. Look," Danny turned to the clerk hiding under the table in feeble-position, "Can I have one box please. I don't have any cash on me, but I promise to pay you back."

The clerk's eyes grew wide, "D-Danny Phantom. Is that really you?"

"Dash?" Danny gasped, realizing the clerk was none other than his old schoolmate who used to stuff him into lockers back in high school.

"Yeah," Dash replied reaching for a box and handing it to the half ghost proudly.

Danny nodded his appreciation and turned to the Box Ghost, "Here, take this and stay out of trouble. Tell everyone what I said. We can try and make peace, everyone just needs to cooperate."

"I will Phantom, but I and every other ghost will tell you, it's not us you need to worry about. It's them," He directed one of his chubby blue fingers toward the window where dozens of people were pressing their faces against the glass trying to catch a glimpse of the ghosts.

Danny sighed extending the box as a peace offering, "Just go."

The Box Ghost accepted the gift, placed it over his head, and turned back to Danny before taking off, "Good luck Danny Phantom."

Danny smiled and nodded, quite pleased his plan worked before realizing his task was far from over.

"Danny," Dash gawked as the half ghost landed and reverted back to his human form. "You're, you're supposed to be dead."

"I've heard a lot of that recently." He smiled.

"W-what happened then? Where did you, and that, ghost?"

"Oh that's just the Box Ghost, he's pretty harmless, but…" However, before Danny could finish the small packaging center was flooded by a wave of people snapping photos and calling his name.

A camera crew pushed through to the front of the swarm, film rolling, and shoved a microphone into Danny's face.

"So, Danny Phantom, how does it feel to be back? If you were not dead, where did you go? Why did you let that ghost get away? Are there more ghosts coming? What is your favorite cereal brand?"

"STOP!" Danny yelled, the noise and commotion was too much. "I mean, thanks everyone for the support, but I really need to go?"

"Can you at least give us a quote?"

"Um," Danny pondered, going ghost and hovering above the horde, "Make sure to look both ways before crossing the street."

The crowed gasped and instantly broke into an uproar as their hero, Danny Phantom, took off.

Above the city, Danny shot through the air as fast as he could and did not turn back until he safely tumbled into his old bedroom. For a few moments the exasperated half-ghost lie silently on the floor, let his mind and thoughts catch up, and changed back to his human form.

Slowly, Danny rose from the floor, stumbled to his bed, and collapsed warily upon it before striking something hard.

"Ouch!" he gasped, rolling over angrily to investigate; however, Danny's rage was promptly snuffed as he reached over and gently caressed the object of his misery, Forever Phantom, Forever In Our Hearts by Sam Manson, in his palms.

"I can't believe it," Danny sighed as he slowly skimmed the pages beginning the accident in the lab when they were merely fourteen up until his disappearance ten years ago. With every page he turned he felt as if he was diverging deeper into Sam's soul. Each chapter in their lives together was so intricately woven and detailed before him in black and white print Danny felt as though he was reliving his own adolescence from her point of view.

"Danny Phantom was the hero we so desperately needed while Danny Fenton was the man we wanted to be. Although neither are here with us anymore, he must live on in our hearts. Out of his sacrifice we all received a second chance, let us not waste that, and we can ensure our hero will never die."

Before Danny had time to catch himself, a tear slowly leaked from his dazzling blue eye and landed softly on the page beside a picture of his fourteen-year-old self and Sam laying lazily beneath a tree in the park. The times were so innocent and carefree the most painful part of it all was the knowledge that a similar simplicity could never again be recaptured.

A rustling noise and faint mutter from the kitchen roused Danny from his bittersweet thoughts as he set the book down on his old desk and quietly crept down the stairs.

A woman in a red jumpsuit was bending over the table, muttering to herself, and rummaging through a large duffle bag, clearly unaware Danny was watching.

"Hey," he leapt out from behind the corner leading into the living room to surprise the intruder, "I don't know who you think you are, but breaking and entering is illegal, and I have had enough paparazzi for one day!"

"Danny," the young woman dropped whatever she was fiddling with and turned slowly to face the half ghost.

"Valerie?"


	7. Mr and Mrs Tucker Foley

Author's Note: WOW! It has been a long time since I last updated. I'm not giving up on you I promise! Anyway, this is my longest and probably most dense chapter yet, so I hope you enjoy and I hope a few blank holes are filled.

Chapter seven:

"Valerie?" Danny gasped, starring blankly at the woman who used to be his friend and fellow hunter.

Valerie rushed over to Danny and embraced him tightly, "Oh I missed you. We just new you would come back one day!"

"We?"

"Tucker and I," she slowly extracted a rather sizable diamond ring from one of the pockets of her jumpsuit.

"Wait hold on a second," Danny stuttered, piecing together the information. "You're married, You a-and Tucker!"

"I know! Can't you believe it? It's been, oh my word, almost five years."

Danny's knees almost gave way as he slowly moved from the kitchen to the living room and collapsed on the sofa. He felt like just been hit with another curve ball.

Valerie followed casually and sat beside Danny. She noticed he was troubled and tenderly placed her hand on his shoulder. "Hey, are you ok?" Her tone shifted from joy, upon conveying her exciting news, to concern for her friend. Danny sunk further into the cushions, wretched a pillow from the side of sofa and buried his face in it.

"I take that as a no." Valerie shook her head and attempted to pry the pillow away from him.

"Danny this is foolish. You can tell me what's wrong."

"Muffim ma mame," his desperate words were muffled by the pillow.

"I can't understand you with a pillow on your head, Danny. Now put it down for a second and talk to me."

Reluctantly Danny heaved a heavy sigh and set the fluffy clump in his lap. "It's just nothing's the same anymore."

"And?"

"And it just doesn't feel right…"

"Well what did you expect?" Valerie injected slightly more firm, "It has been a decade. Ten years is a long time. Isn't it foolish to believe we would have all put our lives on hold? Especially since we thought you were gone. The world eventually had to move on."

"I know," Danny groaned.

"Hey I understand you are confused, and hurt by the looks of it. But be positive. A lot of good has happened in this time. A lot of progress has been made. Maybe you would feel better if you stand back and optimistically observe what all has transpired since you left instead of mulling over it."

Danny turned to face Valerie directly, "But how?"

She shook her head, "I can't tell you that. You have to work that out yourself."

Suddenly they were interrupted by an obnoxious beeping noise coming from one of the pockets on Valerie's jump suite. "Oh shoot," she muttered extracting a PDA.

"I'm sorry I don't have more time to chat, but I'm due for a meeting back home, so I've got to go. I'm working for the Department of Homeland Security, but in the meantime," Valerie stood up, shuffled through her bag until she pulled out an invitation, and handed it to Danny.

"There is someone in Washington who wants to meet you. Take this to the Capital Building and tell one of the clerks that Congressmen Foley sent for you."

"Tucker?"

Valerie quickly gathered her things and headed for the front door where her jet board was waiting. "I hope to see you soon, Danny Fenton." She turned and winked playfully before taking off on her board, leaving Danny alone to ponder the invitation in his kitchen.

He was unaware of how long he stood there, starring blankly at the think brown embossed lettering on the envelope. However, all the while he hunched, Valerie's words rung through his head. Maybe he had been looking at things too negatively. After all, change is good right? Valerie and Tucker seemed happy; come to think of it Sam, Jazz, and his mother did too.

Danny sighed. Perhaps the reason he was most bitter, was not because everything was different, but because he had missed so much.

Silently, and almost instantaneously after his mind was made up, Danny stuffed the letter into his pocket, transformed into his ghost self, and took off through the roof of the kitchen. He never looked back.

In no time at all Danny was flying over Washington and landed softly upon the pearly white steps of the Capital Building. It was hard to believe that Tucker worked here, Tucker, his nerdy, techno-geek friend since the sandbox era. Danny ascended the steps and into the grand building itself where a secretary began eyeing him curiously.

Danny suddenly realized he was still in his ghost form and reverted back to his human self. The young woman's eyes grew wide.

"Oh, um hi," Danny glanced down at her name plate, "Janice. I'm here to see Tucker Foley, I mean Congressman Foley." He extracted the now crumbled letter from his pocket and handed it to her.

Janice nervously took the invitation from Danny and quickly reviewed it. "Right this way," she smiled and lead Danny past security, threw an elevator, and down a long, narrow hallway to room 429 on the right.

"Mr. Foley will be here momentarily." The clerk smiled and hesitated for one last glimpse of the young hero before closing the door reluctantly behind her.

Danny turned to face the room, a small four-sided enclosure with one window and an undersized desk at the far end. Slowly, he meandered over to where a green office chair sat juxtapose an oak desk, collapsed in it, and began strumming his fingers on the hard tabletop.

Danny's eyes began to wander, and as he became accustomed to his surroundings, one wall in particular caught his attention. It was completely lined with pictures from the past decade: Tucker and Valerie's wedding, Tucker and Valerie at the beach, Tucker and Valerie in front of a small yellow town home in DC, and Sam holding a small black-headed infant in her arms. Danny's heart ached. Beside it was a picture of Tucker and Charlie playing hide and seek and another of Charlie, Sam, and Valerie touring the capitol city subtitled, "Girl's Night on the Town."

Danny had long abandoned his post beside the desk and was now standing with his face inches away from the wall that detailed every moment he should have been there, the wedding, Sam, Charlie.

His stomach flip-flopped as he starred intensely into the little girl's impish face. She was adorable, although slightly emaciated, but seemed happy nonetheless surrounded by Sam and Valerie.

It was with much pain and inevitable guilt that Danny couldn't help but feel little, sickly, innocent, Charlie may be the greatest cause and symbol of the great rift between him and Sam. He hated and was thoroughly disgusted with himself for allowing these hidden fears to creep up on him; however, he had never loved anyone else. Therefore, it was mostly out of jealously and spite he felt this way, Charlie had a father, and Sam had been with him.

"A lot's happened in ten years."

Danny snapped from his trance and wheeled around to face the voice coming from the door.

"You know after all the years we were best friends, I'm offended I had to send my wife and an invitation to get you to come see me."

"Hey Tuck!" Danny smiled weakly, ignoring Tucker's sarcastic remark.

"Oh no don't bother, I wouldn't want to put you out of your way or anything."

Danny met Tucker in the center of the small office, "I'm sorry man, it was just,"

"Hey don't mention it." Tucker extended his hand sophistically; however, Danny bypassed it and wrapped Tucker in a firm, friendly hug.

"It's good to have you back!"

"It's good to be back." Danny clapped Tucker on the shoulder.

He had grown immensely taller, but not more than Danny, his shoulders were much more broad, and his voice deeper. Tucker was no longer the same shrimpy techno-geek Danny knew from high school. He really looked like a successful statesmen.

Tucker simply shook his head, crossed the room, and solemnly slunk in the squashy office chair across the desk from Danny. A short, awkward silence settled between the two before Tucker asked the inevitable, "So, I've got to tell you, Ever since I heard rumor that Danny Phantom was back I have asked everyone from the Secretary of State to the janitor for information. I finally got hold of a newspaper," Tucker pulled a thick copy of the Washington Post from his brief case and slide it across the glossy, oaken desktop to Danny, "To find nothing except your face plastered across the front of it, but I've got to know… What happened? As your best friend I deserve benefits!"

Danny's insides churned as he took the newspaper in his hands and glared down at himself floating over the crowd at the FedEx. He sighed heavily and gazed somberly out the window looking over the vast, green Mall.

"I haven't told anybody yet, Sam didn't believe me and my mom, she just too hysterical at the moment."

"Told anyone what, Danny?" Tucker coaxed, "The last time I saw you was the night of graduation. You and Sam took off to be alone for a while, and the ghosts revolted."

Danny blushed for a second recalling the night of graduation, "Yeah, Sam and I went back to her place just to you know chill, and then the ghosts zone simply seemed to burst. Every villain I had ever fought was running rampant throughout the streets. I knew I didn't stand a chance against them all. It was completely over whelming so Sam and I, we…"

"What? Danny what did you do?"

"We went to the lab and well, you know my dad had been working on the portal, trying to find a way to reverse its pull to suck all the ghosts back into the zone."

"Oh I remember, like an ultra thermos."

"Yeah, a super thermos we called it." Danny chuckled softly before resuming his glazed stare, "My dad warned us, he tried to tell us, the invention was too unstable, that it wasn't going to work yet. He feared that attempting to use it at it's fragile state might have some unforeseeable consequence on the balance between the two realms."

"Let me guess, you did it anyway…"

"We didn't know what else to do. People were dying, I couldn't stop all the ghosts, we had to fight just to make it back to my place, my parents were out trying to quash the revolt, neither of us were thinking rationally, so I did it. Next thing I knew I was trapped in the zone with every other ghost, and every portal was closed, even the naturally occurring ones."

"So wait, if you were trapped in the Ghost Zone for ten years? How did you finally get back out?"

"Through Vlad's old portal in Wisconsin. Somebody must have opened it from the outside."

"Any idea who?" 

"I wish I knew. Quite frankly, right now I'm really not sure what to believe."

"Aren't you glad to be back?"

"Of course, Tuck, you have know idea how liberating it feels, but everything and everyone is different, I just don't know… And the other ghosts, their leaking out by the second. What if the person who opened the portal intended to let all the ghosts out? They must know something that I don't because I've been trying to reconnect with the human world for a decade! What if it's the same person who led the ghosts to revolt in the first place?"

"I don't know."

"Well, something's not right, I can guarantee that." Danny flung his arms peevishly in the air and rubbed his fingers threw his sweaty, black hair.

Tucker shook his head and eyed Danny with concern. A long moment of silence slowly cooled the heated moment. Danny was tense and Tucker still utterly perplexed. Janice, the Secretary, heard some of the commotion from the break-room down the hall and personally delivered drinks to the office, more likely to get another look a Danny than out of kindness. As she left, the tranquility slowly crept in once more, growing slightly more awkward with each passing minute.

"So," Danny finally interrupted the silence by completely switching gears, "You and Valerie. Wow!"

"Yeah, I knew you'd say that eventually." Tucker chuckled, casually stirring his scotch, "You know we were kind of hitting it off before you left, but after… I don't know the tragedy sort of brought us closer together. There's a picture of the wedding on my wall over there."

Danny nodded, "I saw it; a lot of nice pictures over there. It all sort of reminds me of how much I really missed."

"I see what you mean," Tucker reclined hoisting his feet on the desk.

"Yeah, with Sam and all," Danny shook his head.

"Charlie's a cute, sweet kid. You don't have anything to worry about."

"It's not that I worry about her, it's more of the situation."

"Probably is rather sticky, but don't worry. Sam is Sam and Charlie has a lot of her father in her, if you know what I mean." Tucker laughed jokingly at Danny who tilted his head in confusion.

"Um," Danny pondered not catching what was so funny, "I don't think I do,"

"Do what?"

"Know what you mean."

"Wait," Tucker suddenly stopped laughing and grew slightly ridged, "You haven't talked to Sam yet?"

Danny lowered his head and sighed, "Yes, I have."

"And,"

"And she's really pissed at me. She accuses me of leaving her, but I would never do that!"

Tucker rubbed his chin in thought. "So wait you don't know yet,"

"Know what?"

"T-that, that. Oh my word!"

"Hey," Danny suddenly burst, "If you know Charlie is a lot like her father then you must know who the asshole who impregnated her was!"

Tucker rubbed the back of his neck nervously, "Oh yeah, I know him alright."

"Well," Danny pressed, "I need to know."

Tucker sighed, "Look let me talk to Sam first. Trust me we all need to meet, the three of us. I hate to say this but it seems to me Sam is clearly off her rocker at the moment, and she's too angry with you to see straight. Before I say anything to you she wouldn't want me letting out, allow me see if I can talk some since into her. She may be angry but she has no reason to hide things from you."

"What things? This is crazy, Tuck."

"Hey, she's not mad at me. I can talk to her. Things are really busy here at work right now but I'll be in Amity Park in a few days for my mother's birthday, just hold on till then."

"What choice do I have?" Danny sighed as their conversation was interrupted by a familiar annoying buzz this time ensuring from Tucker's PDA.

Slightly unnerved, Tucker extracted the device from his back pocket and groaned, "They've called an emergency meeting of Congress. Shoot I have to go!"

Tucker dashed from his chair and began straightening his tie and glasses. "They've called an emergency Congressional meeting, In light of recent events, the note says."

"Recent events as in me?" Danny muttered.

"You don't know that for sure, but probably. I wonder what they're going to say."

"Nothing good I suppose."

Tucker sighed as Danny rose and turned into Danny Phantom. "I'd better get going then."

"Hey, I'll be in Amity Park soon, okay. Just stay in touch. I'll call you after the meeting to give you the load down. I assume it won't be much, the people love you, and nothing's happened so far. This is generally standard precaution in theses cases, I'll probably be in and out before you're even back at Fenton Works."

"I hope so." Danny sighed as he walked over to Tucker and clapped him on the back. "See you later then?"

"Of course," Tucker nodded and stepped out the door before turning back for a final remark, "Just remember, hold off on Sam until I get there. The situation is probably far more sticky than you could possibly imagine."

Danny nodded. "Tucker?"

"Yeah,"

"Just out of curiosity, who was your Best Man?"

Tucker smiled, "No one could take that spot away from you, so I had Jazz fill in."

"Jazz," Danny laughed as Tucker closed the door, leaving him alone in the dark office. The room was quiet and Tucker's footsteps grew fainter until everything stood at a complete standstill. Janice was probably still at the front desk, it was late, and Danny really didn't want to deal with anything or anyone else so, in an instant, he took off into the crisp, night air heading straight toward Amity Park.


	8. Up for the Challenge?

**Sorry it's been so long since I last updated. To make up for it, I'm planning on updating at least two more times while I'm on break from school, so check back often. Sam and Charlie are finally returning in the next chapter, but don't wait until then. This is a very important chapter plot wise, a little bit of Danny angst and a lot of Tucker.**

**Merry Christmas and enjoy!**

**Davenee**

Tucker was still shaking his head in disbelief on his brisk hike to the conference room. So many questions filled his head. The thought of everything he had to do overshadowed his previously gleeful mood. With so many personal issues to sort out, he really didn't want to deal with anything work related at the moment, not even the President of the United States.

Quickly, Tucker slipped into a crowded the elevator packed with other congressman on their way to the conference. It took him down a few floors and lead into yet another long hallway. This one, however, was much wider and elegant than the one he worked on, most likely to impress any foreign guests or the press. The meeting was scheduled to take place before the whole Congress, rarely were events of this magnitude scheduled on a last second basis.

"Evening Reginald," Tucker nodded to the guard as he pulled out his ID. It appeared the meeting was just about to get started by the time Tucker passed threw security and forced his way around the circular room, through the narrow rows to his chair.

"Just if time Foley," Gerald Jennings, a young representative from Wisconsin whispered to Tucker as he sat down and let out a repressing sigh of relief.

"Do you know why we're hear?" Tucker asked Jennings while an old, white man who looked like he had been around long enough to have served under Franklin Roosevelt, stood up to address the President.

"You haven't heard?" Jennings whispered to Tucker, ignoring the old man's crackly drawl. He sounded shocked.

"Heard what?" Tucker was pretty sure he knew.

"Danny Phantom, he's back!"

"Oh no, really, I didn't know." Tucker sank slightly in his seat. That was just what he didn't want to hear…

"And without further adieu," The Methuselah-like man continued, "The President of the United States of America."

Slowly the whole congress, including Tucker, rose to applaud their leader and with a clattering of chairs, sat on his command.

The President was a tall man with broad shoulders. He had a commanding physical presence that aided him well in his political career. His publicity ratings were high and he had just been elected for a second term. Tucker respected him well enough and campaigned for him through his first election, which that helped him in his own race.

"Most of you already know why it was imperative we convene today." The President began solidly, fluently, "For ten years the world has not felt a tremor of ecto disturbance from the Ghost zone. For an entire decade, the two worlds remained, as they should have, two separate worlds. Today that is no longer the case.

All of us sitting here today can recall what happened the last time a mass breakout from the ghost zone occurred: total chaos. Helplessly the whole world threw themselves at the feet of the then eighteen-year-old half ghost teenager, Danny Phantom, who was trying just as hard to graduate high school as save the world."

Tucker began to sweat. He felt awkward, sitting here listening to such a powerful figure talking about his best friend he hadn't seen in ten years. The room was completely silent, save for the President's booming speech. Every man or woman's gaze was locked on the podium.

"That was ten years ago. We were lucky to have escaped then. Now, Let's think back on this past decade. These last ten years have been filled with prosperity, peace both foreign and domestic, and innovation. We have learned it does not benefit to have ghosts constantly appearing. They were a disturbance."

A few head's in the crowd nodded, other's remained sitting stiff as boards, Tucker was slouching nervously, rubbing his sweaty palms together.

"The real question we must address now, as a nation is whether we really want to risk putting ourselves in the same position we were ten years ago?"

Suddenly Jennings, beside Tucker, rose to his feet, "But what about Danny Phantom?"

"What about Danny Phantom?" The President repeated the question, "He has proved himself today he is no friend of ours."

A tremor of disturbance rang through the crowd. Was he calling Danny Phantom disturbance as well?

"We are joined here today by agents K and O," The President continued over the sudden outburst, "Two of the Guys in White that were assigned to the Danny Phantom case before we knew anything about him. According to the agents' research, so many years being half ghost and living in such close proximity with the others is bound to have altered young Mr. Fenton's perception on the matter. He is no better than the rest of them."

"How could you say that?" Jennings spoke on behalf of the many congressmen in the crowd who were appalled by the President's proclamation.

"Because Danny Phantom wishes to let the all ghosts run around our country unrestricted and unfettered. That cannot happen! Ghosts do not care about humans! We lived in ten years of peace without the likes of them here. Danny Phantom poses the greatest threat to us ever being able to achieve peace again!"

Miles away in Amity Park Danny had had enough. Angrily he turned off the TV, the conference was being broadcast on C-SPAN, and chucked the remote at the wall so hard he punctured a whole in it.

"Stupid Government, Stupid President, Stupid people!" he spat angrily into the silence of his living room. "How can they not see I'm just trying to do what's best for everybody!"

"Danny!" A dark silhouette appeared at the foot of the stairs. "Danny, what's all the yelling about it's getting late?" It was his mother, wrapped in a fuzzy pink robe tiptoed into the living room and stood beside her son.

Danny sighed, slumped onto the sofa, and ran his fingers nervously threw his thick, black hair. "It's not fair, mom. It's just not fair! I'm trying to do something good, so both sides can win and they just shoot me down, try to make me out as some kind of deranged villain or something."

Maddie sat beside her son and tenderly placed a loving hand on his shoulder. "What happened Danny?"

"The President, Tucker, Washington! I went see Tuck today and we had a nice chat, caught up talked about old times and all that, then he had to go to a meeting. We left and I flew back here where I've been watching the live broadcast of his conference on TV."

"Obviously something didn't go so well."

Danny shook his head in desperation, "They're all against me! All of them! The President was even taking the Guys in White's opinion on me. They hate me and always have! None of them know it was me who sent all the ghosts back into the zone ten years ago! They think it was just a happy miracle. I sacrificed everything I had for these people and, and…"

Danny could hardly believe it, but finally everything he had been through since he came back finally reached boiling point. The lid that had been keeping all his emotions at bay came flying off and he cried. He cried like a baby in his mother's arms.

Maddie was shocked and hurt at the same time. She hadn't seen her son cry since he was a little boy. But she was also hurt by the fact anyone would try and make her son, her hero, the villain in all of this. Danny was the single most unselfish boy, or man she knew. He was always doing something for others over himself. That's what made him a hero.

"Danny," she stroked her fingers lovingly threw his hair.

"It's every mother's dream to see their son grow up, become a man. My little boy became a hero. Know matter what happens first know how proud I am of you. Your father would be too."

Danny nodded, "I know that, and thank you mom, It's just, just… How can they blame me for everything! I've never done anything to hurt anybody. I sacrificed my family, my friends, Sam, and my life to save their sorry asses and this is what I get; to be singled out like a dangerous freak!"

"They just don't like your tactics I'm afraid."

"Well too bad! They're not going to change. Those rotten hypocrites haven't given me any reason to believe they're any better than what they make ghosts out to be. If I really am the good guy I need to be fair. Just like there are some foul ghosts there are some downright horrible people as well."

Maddie tightened her grip on her son's shoulder.

"If I learned anything from my time in the Ghost Zone, it was to be true to myself. I'm not human; I'm half ghost, and somehow I will find a way to balance the two out. I just need people and ghosts to keep an open mind."

"That's asking a lot, you know. People can be very prejudice and ghosts can be rather uncooperative."

"I know, but I feel like I don't have a choice."

"You always have a choice."

For the first time since he left Tucker, Danny turned to his mother and smiled, "Well then I guess I'm up for the challenge."

After two hours of debate the meeting back in Washington finally adjourned. Tucker was mentally and physically exhausted after all the yelling, fist pounding, and heated discussion he had just been an integral figure in, but he knew he would have to get back to Amity Park as soon as possible.

Instead of heading back to the office to collect his things Tucker sped from the conference room with only his brief case in hand, and hailed a taxi to get him home where his Model T (for Tucker) Fenton Speeder was stored in the garage. Hastily he climbed into the small speeder, a tiny two passenger more agile version of the air craft, and took off threw the night sky toward Amity Park.

He set the course on autopilot to allow him time to rest and reflect on the last few hours of their meeting. The President proposed going after Danny, because he was convinced the breakout was Danny's fault and that he did not have the interests of humanity in mind when he proposed establishing a peaceful relationship between the two worlds.

Tucker, on the other hand, spent two hours defending his best friend and in the end the Congress voted not to take any action at the moment. They voted it would be best for them to wait and at least see how the next few days would play out before they would reconvene in a week.

Tucker never expected the President, a man he had the utmost respect for, to want to take such hostile, uncivil remarks about Danny and the other ghosts. He shook his head in shock and disbelief. It just didn't make sense.

It was almost one o'clock in the morning when Tucker finally flew over Amity Park. As silently as he could he piloted the speeder along the street Sam lived and parked in a narrow, dimly lit alley.

With a yawn, he dismounted the cramped cockpit and stretched his aching legs on the way to the front door. It was late so he wasn't sure whether to knock or ring the doorbell, but settled on the bell to not wake the neighbors.

It wasn't long before Sam answered the door. She looked as if she hadn't slept in days.

"Sam, something's gone wrong. It's about Danny. If you don't mind I need to spend a few nights here until we can sort out this mess."

"It's two in the morning Tucker."

"I know, I'm sorry. But I'll have to wait and explain after some sleep."

Sam sighed, pondered, nodded, and finally opened the door wider to her best friend, "Come in Tuck."


	9. Lies and Confessions

**Told you I would make up for the temporary hiatus… Well, here it is, a chapter many of you have been waiting for. I hope I don't disappoint. **

Have Fun… Davenee 

Early the next morning Sam and Tucker were sitting at the table in Sam's kitchen sipping coffee. Tucker was exhausted from his long night and neither found much sleep. Then again, Sam hadn't slept well since Danny came back.

Sun was just starting to seep through a large open window in the breakfast nook when Tucker finally opened his mouth, "Sam you know we have to talk."

Sam titled her head with a heavy sigh but before she could respond was interrupted by the loud clatter of Charlie running down the stairs. Full of energy, at least much more than either of the adults, the nine-year-old dashed into the kitchen and threw herself upon an unsuspecting Tucker. He barley had time to set down his hot cup of coffee.

"Uncle Tucker!"

"Her kiddo, how's it going?" Tucker struggled to put on a happy for Charlie.

"I heard you come in last night, but I'm not allowed to get out of bed after mommy tucks me in so I had to wait until morning to see you." She was gasping for breath, "Why are you here?"

"Well," Tucker fought his way around the truth, "Your mother and I have some business to take care of so…"

"Does it have to do with Danny Phantom?"

"Well,"

"Because I met him the other day! He's really nice, just like you said he was. He actually came to our house to see mom the other day. _Our _house _my _mom, only I didn't recognize him then. I must be the luckiest kid in the universe!"

Tucker chuckled to himself, "Funny you should say that…"

The color drained from Sam's face and she shot him a horrible, "Watch you mouth," stare before rushing over the Charlie.

"I think that's quite enough for right now, honey. Why don't you just go back upstairs."

Charlie was confused, "Why mommy? I want to stay and talk to Uncle Tucker. Is Aunt Val here too?"

Tucker shook his head and was about to say something before Sam cut him off.

"Charlie did you clean your room yesterday like I told you to?"

Charlie hung her head, "No."

"How about you go do that right now, get dressed, brush your teeth, and I promise Uncle Tucker and I will take you to the park later. We just have a few grown up things to talk about for a second."

"But I'm hungry and it's breakfast time."

Sam sighed and slumped over to the pantry. "Here," she pulled out a bag of Poptarts and tossed them to her daughter. You can eat them while your cleaning your room."

"But you said I'm not allowed to eat upstairs."

"You can this time. My treat."

Defeated, Charlie ran over to Tucker, gave him one last hug, and with a weak smiled scampered back up the stairs. Sam watched from the foyer to make sure she was all the way up and was not satisfied until she heard the door close.

Back in the kitchen Tucker was laughing to himself.

"What's so funny?" Sam spat moodily, plopping herself on the countertop.

"Oh nothing, I just find it slightly ironic that Danny Phantom is Charlie's new favorite superhero."

"Oh yeah that's all we talk about around here these days. I've been cursing myself four forty-eight hours about writing that stupid book. Apparently I'm the Danny expert."

"Well, you have gone lived every fan girls dream with him."

"Shut up Tucker this isn't funny."

"Yes it is, and you deserve it. I wonder what kind of hero she'll think Danny is when she finds out he's her father. Hell what's Danny gonna think. That thought crossed ever crossed through your stubborn head?"

"If they ever find out."

Tucker quit laughing.

Sam caught the rift of Tucker's sudden mood switch. "What?" she pleaded, folding her arms across her chest.

"What do you mean what? You haven't told Danny yet and that's wrong. I'm being completely serious now."

"Yeah I can see that." Sam sighed and shifted her position uncomfortably on the counter. "I've got nothing to tell him."

"So Danny has no right to know Charlie's his daughter?"

"Well, he hasn't been here. He's the one who left!"

"That's bull shit and you know it!" Tucker was raising his voice. "Danny never meant to leave. He never wanted to. According to him you were there when it happened, yet you have to be so thick, so blind, so stubborn. Why Sam?"

"I, I, don't remember it…"

"Oh please you don't remember. It fits perfectly. We were at the graduation party, you two went off together alone, that's where Charlie comes in I suppose, ghosts attack, and suddenly they're gone. Val and I found you on the floor of the Fenton's lab!"

"I seriously don't remember anything!"

"That still doesn't give you the right to hide Charlie from him. He loves you and you still love him. Hell, not a day went by these past ten years where you didn't think of him. He was a mess when he came to see me, in pain. How could you do that to him?"

"Stop." Sam was starting to cry.

"After all he's been through!"

"I mean it Tucker shut up!"

"He sacrificed everything for us. He gave up his friends, his family, you, his life, how could you just ignore him like that?"

"Nobody asked him to!"

"I can't believe you Sam. Danny was just being Danny and you know that, always putting others before himself."

"Well…"

"What right do you have to shut him out when you know damn well you still love him?"

Finally Sam snapped and charged at Tucker. All she wanted to do was cause him some sort of physical pain for the way he was making her feel; like dirt, no lower than that even. She had been selfish, petty, a hypocrite.

Tucker caught her and she melted to the floor. In a softer, more hushed voice Tucker asked again, "Why haven't you told him anything?"

"B-because, I-I don't want things to change."

"You don't want things to change?"

"For Charlie. I want him back I love him, I do. Every time I see him I just want to scoop me up in his arms so we can fly. It's been so long since I've been flying." Sam was shaking as her heart leaked out its most secret desires.

"Then why don't you?"

"Because I have Charlie now, and she comes first."

"But how would things change for Charlie?"

"S-she would k-know, s-she's different and about Danny and ghosts and why she gets sick all the time. She would start asking questions I don't have answers to and she would have to go to Danny. And he of course can't actually be her father because then everyone would know she was his daughter and her life would never be the same!"

Tucker nodded, "It's ok to be scared, Sam, but it's so unlike you. Things will change, but only for the better. Charlie has every right to know about herself, and Danny has every right to know her."

"I know."

Tucker remained kneeling beside Sam until she had clamed down a little. For a few minutes everything was silent save for Sam's occasional sniffling. Finally, Tucker decided to tell her about the conference and reason number one why he had to get here so fast.

"I can't believe the President would say those kinds of things about Danny." Sam muttered softly, "He always seemed like such a level headed man."

"I guess, as far as level headed politicians go. I have to find Danny and warn him. It would probably be best if he just lay low for the next few days. As long as he doesn't do anything stupid he should be in the clear for at least a little while."

"Good luck with that." Sam chuckled to herself, "Danny always had trouble sitting on the sidelines."

"Did you hear something?" Tucker interrupted, rose, and hoisted Sam off the kitchen floor.

"No, but it was probably just Charlie. I should check on her." Sam swooped immediately to the foot of the stairs.

"Charlie?" She yelled, "Charlie, how's your room coming?"

Silence, nobody was answering.

"Charlie, this isn't a game. If you can hear me say something!"

Again nothing.

Panic slowly settled in as Sam darted up the stairs followed in hot pursuit by Tucker. She raced down the short hallway and flung open the door to her daughter's room. Nobody was there.

On the verge of tears again, Sam franticly began checking in every closet cupboard, under the bed, and in the bathroom for her daughter.

Sam muttered nonsense to herself as she searched every upstairs room franticly. Finally, after a few minutes, Tucker found something.

"Sam," he muttered gravely, hunching over Charlie's bedside table. There was a note in his hand. "Sam you may want to take a look at this."

With her heat racing and sweat poring down the side of her face Sam slowly sauntered over to Tucker's side.

"I'm sorry," he muttered, handing her the note. On purple stationary etched in Charlie's nine-year-old scribble was the short message:

"You always told me not to lie."


	10. Half of a Half Ghost?

Well, I have met my promise of updating at least two times on my Christmas break, but with another week left except more to come! I want to thank all my reviewers especially those who have reviewed every one of my chapters. You are the ones who have truly inspired me, given me advise, and kept me from doing things incredibly stupid (Sorry for the Pirates of the Caribbean quote)….

_This is a rather tender chapter featuring a completely inevitable conversation between Sam and Charlie… in light of recent events!_

_Go PACK Go!!! (2007 NFC North Champs baby!)_

_Davenee_

**Chapter 10: Half of a Half Ghost?**

Sam lied; her mother had been lying to her since she was born. The salty taste of this betrayal was still fresh in Charlie's mouth as she sauntered down the sidewalk through the park, alone.

Her mother always said her dad was dead, but she never stopped believing he would miraculously come back some day. It was probably every child's dream who mysteriously lost a parent he or she never knew. Now that the miracle actually happened, however, it just seemed too much. Danny Fenton, Danny Phantom was not her hero, but her father.

Charlie kicked a can in frustration. Not only had Sam not told her anything about her parentage, _he_ didn't know either. The wind picked up as many people in the park pointed upward and gasped. Danny flew by.

Charlie's stomach flip-flopped at the site of him. Suddenly it all made sense, why she was sick all the time. She had to sit down.

Charlie plopped herself on a swing and started swaying, solemnly, back and forth. Danny was half ghost _and_ her father. She started piecing information together. He wasn't completely human, so what did that make her? This was the most haunting question.

Was she sick due to some freaky genetic complex, an impossible mix of human and ghost DNA, or was she sick at all? Could it possibly be she simply didn't know how to control her own body, her own emotions?

An ambulance and horde of police cars raced by in the direction Danny had appeared only minutes before. The whole situation was so surreal.

"Charlie!" Sam's distressed scream resonated over the bustle of people in the park. The distressed mother, immediately upon reading the note her daughter left, bolted from the house in search of her. As more and more people left the park, hastily herding themselves in the direction Danny Phantom had just been sited, she finally spotted Charlie gently swirling the swing back and forth. "Charlie!"

"No!" The little girl shouted. She began fiercely pumping her arms and legs as hard as she could to elevate the rickety swing higher. Sam ran over to her side but Charlie was swinging out of reach.

"Charlie just come back down so we can talk."

"No!"

"Please…"

"No!"

"I'm sorry!"

"You lied to me!"

"I know, I know, and I am _so_ sorry! Just listen to me for a second!"

"No!" Charlie kept swinging.

"Don't make me stop you!"

"I'd like to see you try!"

Sam stood rooted to her spot. Never in nine years had she made Charlie this mad at her. They rarely fought in general. Unfortunately, if there was one blatant trait Charlie inherited from Sam, it was a stubborn attitude. Sam knew the child was baiting her, and Charlie would keep pumping her little arms and legs until they gave out.

"Charlie, stop!" Sam thrust her arms out in front of her daughter and let the swing hit her. Both mother and daughter fell tumbling to the ground.

"Stop it mom. Go away!"

"Charlie I need to have a word with you!" She grasped her daughter's shoulder firmly and tried to turn the hot-tempered child to face her. Charlie would not comply.

"I said, don't touch me!" She yelled. Sam lost her grip as her hand phased threw Charlie's shoulder. "Serves you right." She mumbled, her eyes flashed green, and she took off running for the nearby tree house.

Thunder reverberated through the dismally gray clouds overhead and it started to rain. Slowly and wet, Sam stood and sauntered over to the tree house that Charlie disappeared into. She felt horrible, deceitful, and guilty for what she had done, but still had to get her daughter to listen. She found Charlie in the far corner of the tree house coughing uncontrollably.

"Shh, honey." Sam scooted over to the child but was hesitant to touch her. She wasn't sure whether or not…

Charlie, on the other had, took a deep breath and flung herself around her mother's neck.

"Why didn't you tell me?" She cried, shaking uncontrollably. Her skin was cold as ice.

Sam shook her head, "I-I thought he was d-dead."

"But what about everything else. That still doesn't change who I am."

"I-I know and I am s-sorry. I really screwed this one up, badly."

"But why didn't you…"

"Because I was scared." Sam cut her off. She knew where this conversation was heading. "I have been scared everyday since I found out I was pregnant with you. It may just be part of the whole motherly complex, but you have to understand my situation…"

Charlie moved out of Sam's lap and gave her mother her undivided attention. The rain picked up, but the wooden roof of the tree house sheltered the pair.

Sam continued, "I was eighteen; living with my parents, worrying about graduating from high school, but not sure what my future was going to hold. I was happy when I was fighting ghosts with Danny, which was what I wanted to do, I didn't want to go to college, and suddenly we were under attack by a breakout of evil spirits from the Ghost Zone. In a matter of weeks I lost the man I loved and found out I was pregnant with his child. I was alone and on top of everything the man in the picture was Danny Phantom. That complicated the situation slightly."

"I'm sorry mommy." Charlie sighed and wiped tears from Sam's eyes.

"Don't be. There are no excuses for me not telling you who your father was. Every child has the right to know that. I was just too afraid. I have been so protective of you since you were born. It was a tough pregnancy for me and a rough first few years of motherhood. I never told you this, amongst other things, but when you were born they didn't even let me hold you for the first three days."

Charlie tilted her head and scrunched her face, "Why not?"

"Because they didn't think you would make it. Your body temperature was far lower than it should have been, your breathing was irregular along with your blood work, and heart rate slower than normal."

Charlie simply couldn't take her eyes off Sam. She was at loss for words.

"I knew there was nothing wrong with you. I assumed these sort of complexities would occur considering the situation, but I wasn't about to tell my doctors that. I knew in order to keep you safe and out of the limelight nobody, absolutely nobody could find out about your connection to Danny. Nobody can find out now. Charlie…"

Charlie connected with Sam. "Charlie, you have to promise me, _promise_ me you won't tell anyone. If anybody ever found out you were Danny's daughter, if… everything… nothing would ever…"

Charlie gently took her mother's hand. "Don't worry about me. I'm a big girl now. I can take care of myself, but Danny… he needs to…"

"I'm going to tell him. Don't you worry about that. I know he needs to know."

For a few minutes both mother and daughter sat silently, listening to the gentle roll of thunder and pattering of rain on the wooden roof.

"But everything turned out ok in the end," Charlie finally spoke up, "Right?"

"What are you talking about?"

"When I was born. You said they wouldn't let you hold me…"

Sam shook her head, remembering and smiled, "Oh yes it did. Finally, I think Tucker threatened the medical staff, they realized your condition was stable and they let me take you home. But that didn't mean my job was going to get any easier. You were a handful as an infant, and again I was all alone."

"But you weren't all alone because I was there."

"You _were there_, if only you would have stopped crying." Sam playfully poked Charlie.

"I'm sorry." She giggled, "Isn't that what babies are supposed to do?"

"Crying yes, turning intangible, no."

"Oh," The smile was quickly wiped off Charlie's face. Sam noticed her daughter's mood shift and reeled her closer. The time had come; Charlie was about to ask the inevitable.

"Mommy," the frail, little girl sighed as she brushed her black bangs out of her face, "Am I really sick? What's really wrong with me, if anything?"

It was hard to hear these words. For almost ten years, since she found out she was going to have Danny's baby, Sam knew their child would be different, yet part of her always lived in denial. Was it too much for a mother to wish her daughter could live a perfectly normal and healthy life? Even though she always new someday she would have to discuss her abnormal parentage with Charlie, no amount of preparation could have made this moment any easier.

"Honey," Sam spoke gently, "Really it's hard to say. This is new territory for me, and I've been around 'this kind of stuff' my whole life."

"This kind of stuff?"

"Ghost stuff. Danny's parents were, at the time, ghost hunters. They built this portal to the Ghost Zone but it didn't work. Well, at least they thought it didn't. Danny, Tucker, and I snuck into the lab and were just messing around when I dared him to go in the portal." She sighed, "You know the story. The rest is history I guess."

"So, so, does that mean I am like him. I have powers to?"

"Again I'm not sure. It would be ridiculous to assume you wouldn't inherit at least some of his supernatural genes. Obviously you have. To what extent I'm not sure? The differences between you and Danny are that he became who he is by an accident. You were born the way you are but cannot be completely like him, with all the powers I should say, because I, your mother, _am_ completely human."

"So I'm half of a half ghost."

Sam looked down at her fragile daughter with tears in her eyes and gently brushed the rain drops out of her black hair that seemed to crystallize against her icy flesh. "I guess you could say that."


	11. The Highest Bidder

_After many, many months of hiatus I am pleased to present the eleventh chapter of this much delayed story. It became clear to me after chapter ten I needed to take some time off because the road from that point forward with this story was completely blank. I am proud to report I have a definite plan in place now to conclude this story; however, as I am entering the fall semester of my senior year in high school will warn that posts may not come continuously. (Unfortunately most of my writing will be geared toward application essays) Nevertheless, I promise to finish where I left off and hope that those of you who took interest in my story before will be satisfied with the next roughly eight chapters…_

_Davenee_

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****Chapter 11: The Highest Bidder**

Every fiber in his body was telling him to turn around at that instant and fly home, but he hadn't spent his first few days back on earth trying to rectify the rift between ghosts and humans for it to all come crashing down now. He flew past his old high school and over the park, meeting up with a pack of police cars, sirens blaring, on their way to the scene of the crime.

"Just lay low, just lay low." Tucker's words were echoing in his head and he knew Tucker was right; however, the strong heroic thread in Danny argued that not doing anything would be worse than doing something. What if he didn't do anything and allowed the ghosts to ruin everything he worked to build? What if they hurt someone? The good people of Amity Park were reaching out to him, calling for him to save them from their strife. Perhaps by not doing anything, when all these people trusted him, would cause them to loose their trust.

It was that judgment that won the internal battle between his heroics and Tucker's logic, so it was heroism that beckoned him to the scene of the crime, the scene where Skullker, Ember, followed hopelessly by the Box Ghost were wreaking havoc over the city. A car lay overturned in the middle of the road, the intersection was a ten-car pile up of crunched vehicles, and water gushed into the streets like geysers shooting out of holes where the fire hydrants had been blasted away. Windows were shattered, people were panicking, a few were bound by bubble wrap like mummies, and above it all Ember and Skullker watched and laughed.

"Skullker, Ember, what happened to making peace!" Danny floated casually over to the ghostly pair who at the moment were too busy giggling like schoolgirls to answer. "Didn't the Box Ghost give you my message? Guys? BOX GHOST!" Danny erupted, swooped down to earth and wrenched the imbecilic, blue, horror before Skullker and Ember.

"I thought I told you to tell them we wanted to make peace."

"I don't recall anything of the sort."

"The box, remember I gave you the stupid box!"

"Oh that one."

"Well did you or did you not tell them?" Danny clenched his fists and it took every ounce of will power left in him to resist strangling the Box Ghost right then.

"Oh clam down Ghost Boy, the insufferable idiot told us." Skullker answered.

"And you obviously didn't agree with the terms."

"We considered them," Ember continued, "Mulled over it awhile and almost accepted them until,"

"Until what?"

"Let's just say, until someone else came along and put in a higher bid with a much more promising plan that appealed to our more traditional standards."

"Your traditional standards?" Danny was thunderstruck. "Who was it? What did they offer?"

Skullker smiled, withdrew a small handgun from one of the many holsters on his person, and strummed his fingers along its side menacingly. "We are not at liberty to say. Our client doesn't like you very much, a trait the other ghosts and I have in common."

"I didn't see you as the type to follow somebody else's lead, Skullker."

"Shows how much you know. Sometimes all it takes is the right leverage and proper amount of power. Besides I like what this new deal has to offer me, so it's only compliance to better my situation anyway. I also get to make your life here so miserable you will wish you were back in the ghost zone."

"And how do you expect to do that. I am one of them you know. You can't expect to turn my own people against my that easily."

"Don't be so sure about that. Remember what I said the other day, you can't continue defending a race that would just as easily persecute you as worship you. Their flaws are what make them human." Skullker inched uncomfortably close to Danny's face forcing him to back away. "All it takes is one little slip, and you'll truly understand the narrow minded nature of these people you protect."

Before Danny had time to react, Skullker pointed the little pistol at his chest and fired. The result, however, was not as minute as the weapon's size suggested. Danny was propelled backward at an astronomical rate following a colossal midair explosion of smoke and fire that took out the sides of two surrounding buildings.

Danny hit the ground so hard when he regained composer he found himself lying in the epicenter of a sizable carter. It began to rain, and citizens gathered around the edges, pointing and gasping at the phantom inside. Danny finally rose, shook himself off, and instinctively sped after Skullker still floating victoriously over the city with Ember at his side. In another flash of black, white, and green Danny collided with Skullker and sent them barreling through the side of a juxtapose office building.

The office had long been evacuated leaving a wake of cluttered paper, staples, and collapsed chairs before Danny and Skullker toppled through. "What do you want to accomplish here Skullker? Just leave Amity Park alone!"

"Why should I when tearing it apart limb from limb is so much fun. And as an added bonus, I get to see the flustered, heart broken look on your face. I have to tell you, it's priceless."

Danny grabbed Skullker by his vest, pulled him up, and with all his might slammed him against the office wall. "I swear to you, don't make me do something I don't want to do. I may not have a thermos with me right now, but I can grantee my mom and sister are mass-producing them at this very moment. Give me one good reason why I shouldn't drag you back to the lab right now and throw you head first into the zone like garbage."

"Even if you could, what good would it do? I'll just climb back out anyway."

"Not before I shut you all back into the zone permanently, and I will enjoy personally dismantling every last portal from here to Antarctica to make sure no ghost rears it's ugly ecto-head in my realm again!"

Rather than becoming angry or riled up, however, at the possibility of once again being tossed into the Ghost Zone like a sack of potatoes, Skullker laughed, a bone chilling and malicious cackle. He shook Danny off him and turned to face the young half ghost. "Because trapping all the ghosts back in the zone worked out so well for you last time." He laughed again, "I mean, can you even call this your realm anymore. Just face it you are more one of us now than them."

"I will never be one of you, and I will never stop defending the people I love and care for. These are my family and friends we are talking about, the only memories that kept me living in the Ghost Zone for a human decade."

"I hate being the barer of bad news, Ghost Boy, well actually I don't. Memories are an imaginary basis that only mirror reality. The only thing that building a world off memories will do is tear you down when you realize that reality moves on. Nothing is ever as good in actuality as it is in a memory."

Danny turned away from Skullker shaking in fury. The pea-brained, ecto, pile of plastic had no idea the nerve he was striking in Danny's heart causing him to burn and shake wildly with uncontrollable fury. Finally, unable to hold in his pain any more, he whirled on Skullker and blasted him through the wall of the complex with an ecto beam so powerful he went out the other side.

"What happened to promoting peaceful relations between ghosts and humans?" Skullker chuckled after regaining his bearings and floating tauntingly above Danny's head.

"Like you said my proposal lost to the highest bidder."

"It has been a real treat chatting with you Danny Phantom, but I've got a town full of fish to fry before lunch and you are beginning to put a damper on my day. I do look forward to facing you again."

"Skullker, if you lay one more slimy ecto-finger on my town again, the only thing you will be facing his more hard time in the Ghost Zone."

"We'll see about that."

Unable to mask his pain anymore, Danny reverted back to his human form and watched blankly as Skullker, Ember, and the dim-witted Box Ghost soared off most likely to cause more chaos. Defeated, he sauntered down the stairs of the office building to the street below where five news crews and a horde of people were waiting for him. Camera lights blinded him, hands grabbed him, microphones and lenses poked him, and all he wanted was to run home to the only place left in this realm that accepted him as a normal person.

"How does it feel to be back, Mr. Phantom?"

"Do you have anything to comment on the President's remarks, Mr. Phantom?"

"Mr. Phantom, Why did you let the ghosts get away?"

"Is it true you don't want to send the ghosts back to the Ghost Zone, Mr. Phantom?"

"Enough!" Danny yelled startling the crowd and the reporters who drew back a foot giving him a more breathing room. "Please, it's Fenton, not Phantom. Black hair, blue eyes, people cloths equals Fenton, jump suite, white hair, Phantom. All Danny Fenton wants right now is to go home, so please just back off!"

Then without going ghost, Danny pushed his way trough the onerous crowd and ran. He ran back down the streets. It began raining so hard he could scarcely see. He ran through the park and past the high school. It started thundering and lightning. The streets were deserted. Rain and thunder muffled his vision and hearing, so Danny screamed at the top of his lungs. He yelled and nobody was listening, nobody was around, and he was alone.

Back at home Maddie and Jazz were sitting on the living room sofa, their faces glued to the TV where the President was issuing a speech from the capital.

"It is with great reluctance that the government has been forced to take more drastic actions to prevent further escalation in the rising ghost sightings and continuing attacks on innocent American lives."

"What is this?" Danny gasped as he trudged into the living room, soaking wet. Jazz and Maddie were teary eyed, and glued to the screen. "Who is that guy, and what does he mean by more drastic actions?"

Maddie shook here head at loss for words and Jazz remained still and wooden. Danny inched closer to the center of the room and tried to latch onto what the square, jawed, broad-shouldered man was stating.

"That's the President, Danny." Jazz finally whispered.

"The President… is this from last night?"

"No, it's broadcasting live."

"Tucker never mentioned anything about a speech today," Danny stated pensively. The room went silent as the three Fentons listened with heart and soul to what the most powerful man in the world was proposing.

"Therefore, to ensure continued safety and stability for our country now and forever, the FBI has been dispatched to arrest Danny Phantom, his conspirators, and all the ghosts that came out of the portals with him. Our scientists are working around the clock with the latest ecto-technology to ensure all ghosts are sent back to the realm they belong in and will never be able to create a rift between Americans and our freedoms again."

"But Mr. President," a young statesman's voice rang out through the crowd, "Danny Phantom is not a ghost. He has a family, friends, and a life here on earth, what gives us the right to toss him in with the other's?"

"Danny Phantom has made his decision and chosen his side, Representative Jennings. And as I stated previously, we cannot sit back and let Danny Phantom allow ghosts to run through our states unrestricted and unfettered. As President of the United States and I will do what it takes to ensure the safety and stability of my country and that means returning to the status our world has lived in for the past ten years. So long as Danny Phantom and the rest of his other-worldly counterparts run loose in our land we will never no peace again!"

Many people in the colossal and ever-extending crowd began to clap and nod their heads. A few whoot whistled and shouted things like, "God Bless America!" But above it all the voice of Representative Jennings and a few other statesmen broke threw chanting, "Proof, proof, where is the proof Danny Phantom is such a bad guy! We need proof!"

These remarks made it to the President's ears and he signaled for the crowd to quiet down. "Stability and sensibility are the first two things I think of with everything I do whether it is getting up in the morning, signing a bill into a law, or sending troops into combat. Danny Phantom has posed an eminent threat to our stability since the moment he arrived back in this realm and has not shown a trace of sensibility in anything he has proposed. Ghosts do not care about humans. They only want to watch us suffer and destroy ourselves from the inside out. I for one will not let this happen!"

"We are just getting word as I speak that Phantom was on the rise with three other ghosts today in his home town of Amity Park. He swooped into the scene, seemed to confer with one of the ghosts on something, and then let them all go. He just let them go. The Danny Phantom that has come back from isolation in the Ghost Zone is not the same teenage hero we lost a decade ago. His heart is hardened, and his mind manipulated. I will say this again it is most unfortunate that circumstances have come to this but I will defend my reason till the day I die, the well being of my country matters more than the existence of one half-ghost, half-human traitor."

"Traitor!" The three Fenton's shouted simultaneously. Maddie and Jazz rose to their feet.

"All I can hope for is that Phantom somewhere inside his soul will find the strength to do what's right and turn himself in. Danny Phantom, if you are listening to this please hear our please for a peaceful transaction. Remember the good times, the people you love, and do what's best. However, if you decide to run and let more people get hurt, just know that we will find you."

It was at that instant, before Danny, Maddie, or Jazz had time to begin digesting the blow they had just taken to their hearts, a loud, foreboding knock at the door reverberated throughout the house. "Open up. It's the FBI!"


End file.
